


Only You

by crose84



Category: The Rookie (TV 2018)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Future Fic, Hurt/Comfort, True Love, gentle angst, hopefully in character, lots of feelings, mentions of trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-14 21:00:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29548287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crose84/pseuds/crose84
Summary: Lucy and Rachel finally deal with the Tim Bradford-shaped elephant in their friendship. It leads to an important and overdue conversation between Lucy and Tim.ORLucy did what she had to do to survive and isn't sorry for it.
Relationships: Tim Bradford & Lucy Chen, Tim Bradford/Lucy Chen
Comments: 9
Kudos: 147





	Only You

**Author's Note:**

> This can be read alone but was imagined as a companion piece to Happiness (Grab it Where You Can) and Take Care of You (Always). I'm so glad that people enjoyed those stories, and I hope you also like this one. This has been the nicest fandom to join. Kudos and feedback always appreciated.

_“In town a few days next week for a conference (Wednesday-Sunday). Brunch on Saturday?” _Lucy Chen reread the message for the hundredth time since her phone had chimed fifteen minutes ago. She looked at the screen again and then put the phone, screen down, on the arm of the couch.__

__She reached for the wine glass that was sitting on the coffee table in front of her and burrowed deeper into the corner of the couch, a throw blanket across her lap. Cujo let out a deep sigh and pressed himself closer against her side. “Sweet boy.” She whispered, rubbing his soft ears._ _

__The glowing numbers on the cable box told her that Tim would be home soon. She pushed play on the remote and tried to settle back into the recorded episode of Real Housewives she’d turned on._ _

__A few minutes later she heard the unmistakable sound of his truck door slamming, followed by his key in the door. Cujo quickly jumped off the couch to make his way over to greet Tim as soon as the door opened. For her part, Lucy turned her attention away from the television to watch their interaction._ _

__“Hey, Bud.” Cujo was already play bowing, his tush wiggling, and tail wagging excitedly. Tim knew it took every bit of self-control the dog had not to jump up onto him. He knelt to scratch him behind the ears, and then the belly as the dog quickly rolled over onto his back._ _

__Lucy just laughed, “Someone missed you.”_ _

__“Just the dog?” He asked her, raising his eyebrows. He stood up, letting his bag fall from his shoulder to the ground, and toeing off his boots. He walked over to the couch, leaning down to drop a kiss on the top of her head. “Why are you sitting in the dark?” The overhead lights in the living room were off, leaving the room illuminated by the street lights coming in the big bay window, the glow of the television, and the light she’d left on behind her in the kitchen._ _

__“Cujo and I were cuddling on the couch. We wanted to be cozy.” She grinned up at him, before handing him her almost empty wine glass. “Refill this, please? There’s still leftover chili in the fridge for you to reheat._ _

__Her phone chimed with an incoming text. He watched her glance over her shoulder to where the phone sat on the couch, but not reach for it. “Jackson mad at you for watching the Real Housewives of Cleveland without him or something?” He nodded at the TV._ _

__She scoffed. “Cleveland? There’s no Real Housewives of Cleveland.” She sighed deeply. “It’s probably Rachel, again.”_ _

__He paused on his way to the kitchen to refill her wine and reheat his dinner. “Are you ignoring her?”_ _

__She sighed again, “not maliciously.” She waited until he was moving around the kitchen before calling after him, “have you told her we’re together?”_ _

__He stared at her across the room, “I haven’t talked to her since we broke up a month after she moved to New York, so no. Have you?”_ _

__She ran a hand through her hair, “no, but she might suspect.” Lucy waited for him to join her on the couch. She took the wine he held out to her, and turned so she was sitting with her back against the arm of the couch, she stretched her legs out across Tim’s lap. “I get a little cagey when she brings you up or asks about my love life.” They didn’t talk all the time. Maybe once every six weeks or so, still Lucy had never been sure how exactly the conversation should go. With Rachel literally across the country, it had been easier to just not bring it up._ _

__“We’re talking about this now, because?” He asked trying to get up to speed and figure out where their conversation was headed. He took a bite of the chili he’d made for them the night before, careful not to drop any down onto her legs. “Should have made cornbread.” He said quietly to himself._ _

__“So domestic.” She smiled softly at him. That discovery would always rank as one of her favorites. She had always suspected it could be the case but the ongoing confirmation never ceased to make warmth bloom in her chest._ _

__“Why are we talking about Rachel?” He tried again to get the full story out of her. He looked down at the dog, who was looking up at him with rapt attention. “Cujo, place.” He told him firmly. The dog sat for a beat, but then got up and walked over to his place bed in front of the TV._ _

__“He would not have done that for me.” She looked between him and the dog._ _

__“Because you would have just invited him up on the couch.” A couch he had rarely been allowed on before they had officially started dating. “Lucy.” He put just a hint of his TO voice behind her name to bring her back on topic._ _

__She rolled her eyes at him but answered. “Rachel’s coming into town next week for a conference. She wants to have brunch with me on Saturday.” She took a drink of her wine. “And I just want to know what kind of brunch this is going to be. Is it going to be a brunch where she pumps me for information about you because she wants to get back together? Or a brunch where she’s going to confront me with her suspicions and be angry at me for breaking the girl code? Or…”_ _

__“Why don’t you just ask her?” Seemed like the easiest option to him._ _

__“Because then I have to tell her that we’re together over a text message. That feels shitty. I could call her, but this feels like a conversation we should probably have in person.”_ _

__“Okay.” He felt like that should have settled it, but Lucy was still wearing a decidedly unsettled look on her face. Thirteen months of spending twelve hours a day in a shop with her told him they weren’t done discussing this._ _

__She reached her arm out and let her nails scratch lightly at the nape of his neck. “She liked you a lot. Like wanted you to move to New York with her liked you. And you thought about it for at least a hot second.” And as of their last phone call, Rachel was still single._ _

__He put his now empty chili bowl on the table, and leaned into her touch, “but I stayed here with you.”_ _

__“She’s my friend. I don’t want to hurt her feelings. What exactly is the gentlest way to be like, ‘hey Rach, so glad to see you, by the way, I’m madly in love with your ex-boyfriend and have been for a really long time. We practically live together, he nursed me back to health after I trashed my leg, we co-parent a dog, and I’m happier than I ever knew was even possible.”_ _

__“Madly in love and happier than you’ve ever been, huh, Boot?” He squeezed her leg gently._ _

__She sat up and climbed into his lap straddling him. She took his face in her hands and pressed kisses along his jaw before finding his mouth. “If you have to question that I must not be doing a good enough job showing you just how madly in love and happy I am.”_ _

__“Happy to have you show me any time you want.” He slipped his hands under her sweatshirt, skimming his fingers up her sides. Even if he didn’t know where exactly on her body the ink still marred her skin he’d be able to tell by the slight shift in her eyes when his fingers found it. Not a flinch, but a hint of self-consciousness, and a healthy but brief burst of relief that it didn’t make him recoil. “I’m madly in love with you too, and whatever is beyond happy.”_ _

__“I know.” And she did know. He’d been finding ways to tell her and show her since before they were even officially together._ _

__“Tell Rachel you’ll see her for brunch on Saturday. You don’t have to figure out what to tell her tonight.”_ _

__She didn’t say anything, but reached over for her phone and quickly sent Rachel an apology for the delay and confirmed that she was in for brunch. She tossed the phone onto the cushion next to them. She carded her hands through her hair and let out a groan, “who knew this stupid bet would still be causing me so much grief all this time later.”_ _

__He filed that interesting comment away for later but didn’t push her on it. “Now, do you need to finish the Real Housewives of Albuquerque or can I take you to bed?”_ _

__He was already shutting the TV off and standing up. She wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. “I guess we’re going to bed.” She buried her face in his neck and huffed out a laugh. “Don’t you think you should take your dog out first?”_ _

__He dropped her onto the bed, “don’t move.” He turned quickly to the door, “Cujo, back door.” He called for the dog to follow him._ _

__“Hurry.” She called after him, still laughing._ _

__~~~_ _

__Lucy sat on the patio of a restaurant that she and Rachel had frequented regularly before Rachel had moved to New York anxiously waiting for her friend to arrive. She pulled out her phone and sent a quick text to Tim, _“If I’m not back in a few hours send a patrol car.”__ _

__He responded almost immediately, _“It will never not be too soon for that joke, Boot.”__ _

___“Sorry, sorry, just nervous.”_ She texted back. _ _

__She slipped her phone back into her bag and scanned the crowd for Rachel again. “Rach!” She called out and waved when she saw her friend approach the restaurant. She stood to hug her tightly. “It’s good to see you!”_ _

__They sat down and Lucy waited until the waiter had taken their drink order and left them with menus before peppering her friend with questions, “how are you? How’s New York? The job? Do you love them both?”_ _

__They caught up easily for a few minutes, placing their order and handing back menus when their waiter came back. Their conversation fell into a lull. “So,” Rachel cleared her throat, before taking a sip of her iced tea, “should we talk about it?”_ _

__“It? Lucy stirred the straw around her glass of Diet Coke._ _

__“The Tim Bradford-shaped elephant at the table.” Rachel clarified. “It has not escaped my attention that you never want to talk about him when we’re on the phone.”_ _

__She forced her hand to stop playing with her straw and purposely put her hands in her lap so she couldn’t fidget. “I didn’t know how much you would want to know.”_ _

__“Fair.” Rachel acknowledged. She wasn’t even sure how much she wanted to know. “Is he okay? Is he happy? Another sergeant position open up yet?”_ _

__“Still waiting.” Sometimes she wondered if he’d known how long it would be before another chance arose if he would still pass on North Hollywood to remain her TO. “He’s happy though.” _Whatever is beyond happy,_ she couldn’t stop the soft smile from playing on her lips as she remembered his words from last week. _ _

__Rachel didn’t miss the way Lucy’s eyes softened or her smile, “Oh.” She looked down at the table. “You’re together.”_ _

__Lucy stilled. “Yeah, we are. We have been for a little while.” She tried to read Rachel’s expression and body language. Her friend wasn’t giving much away._ _

__Rachel just nodded. “I sort of figured, and I mean, it’s not surprising.” If she was honest with herself she was expecting the news sooner or later. Perhaps the only surprise was that it hadn’t happened sooner._ _

__“Nothing happened while you were together. Nothing happened until after I became a P2.” Lucy assured her._ _

__Rachel was quiet for a minute. “That’s not exactly true.” She said finally._ _

__“Rachel.”_ _

__“I’m not stupid, Lucy, or blind.”_ _

__“I know! I never thought or said…”_ _

__Rachel inhaled a deep breath and let it out slowly.”I saw the way that you two looked at each other.” She hadn’t been blind, but she had chosen to ignore a lot. “You were present in so many of our conversations. He’d talk about how you handled yourself on a call, something funny you said or did, want to know if I thought you were as okay as you kept saying you were after your kidnapping. I asked him about it once, and at first, he seemed confused, like he didn’t know how much he was talking about you, but then he said something about you being something we had in common.”_ _

__“I didn’t know that,” Lucy said quietly._ _

__“Come on, Luce.” She let out a humorless laugh. “He wouldn’t leave your side in the hospital. He practically had Jackson’s schedule memorized, because he worried about you being alone. How many times did he come over to your apartment in the middle of the night after you had a particularly bad nightmare and Jackson wasn’t home? Or talk you down over the phone? He took in the dog because he was important to you.”_ _

__He had done all of that and more for her in the weeks and months following her kidnapping, and she had never really let herself think about what it could be doing to his relationship with Rachel. “I’m sorry, I’m sure that wasn’t easy for you. I’m not sorry for leaning on him to survive though.” She had done so much hard work and was still doing hard work, in therapy and on her own to continue to live with her trauma, but she wouldn’t be where she was now without Tim, Jackson, and the others._ _

__“I don’t know why you set us up in the first place, Lucy.”_ _

__“I thought you would have a decent enough time at dinner for me to earn my short sleeves. In my wildest dreams, I never imagined that you would hit it off well enough to even date let alone ask him to move to New York with you.” She truly hadn’t seen that coming at all._ _

__The waiter chose that moment to appear with their food. Rachel waited until he had set their plates down and left the table. “Tim was never going to come to New York with me. Finding out that he’d lose his rank and have to start over from the bottom gave him the out that he needed, but he was never going to leave you.”_ _

__“I never meant to put you in a position to get hurt.” She’d only ever thought of the bet as a fun, harmless way to get her short sleeves. Annoy Tim a little bit. At most, she thought she’d owe Rachel dinner or drinks as a thank you for playing along. “I clearly didn’t think it through.”_ _

__Rachel pushed her salad around on her plate, before putting her fork back down, “I don’t want him back. That’s not what this is. I’m happy with my life in New York. He was always your guy.”_ _

__Lucy met Rachel’s gaze across the table, “are we okay?”_ _

__“Yeah, we’ll be okay.” She picked up her fork again. “I hope this place still has that amazing lava cake on the menu. We’ve definitely earned chocolate.”_ _

__“Definitely.” Lucy agreed._ _

__~~~_ _

__Lucy used her key to let herself into Tim’s house. She kicked off her shoes and lined them up by Tim’s to the left of the door. She’d only been inside less than a minute, but she thought it was strange that neither of her boys had acknowledged her return._ _

__She started to call out for them when she finally got a good look at the couch. Tim was sound asleep, Cujo had managed to wedge himself between the back of the couch and Tim. He was sound asleep too with his snout buried in Tim’s neck. She stood a moment, just to take in the sight in front of her. _Her boys. Her family.__ _

__She made her way over to them as silently as possible, surprised the two light sleepers hadn’t startled awake yet. She knelt on the floor next to the couch and ran her hand gently through Tim’s hair before pressing her lips softly to his forehead. She stroked the top of Cujo’s head too._ _

__Lucy watched them sleep for another moment, before carefully rising to grab her book and sneak out the back door to read in the sunshine while they finished their nap._ _

__~~~_ _

__“When did you get back?” He dropped a kiss on the top of her head, before sitting down on the patio chair next to hers._ _

__“A while ago.” She tossed her book on the table and moved to sit on his lap. She hadn’t been able to focus on the book anyways, reading the same page multiple times trying to absorb the story. “You and the boy were completely passed out. Neither of you even stirred a little when I came in.”_ _

__“You should have woken us up.”_ _

__She leaned deeper into his embrace. “You needed your rest.” And she’d needed some time alone to process her thoughts. Her conversation with Rachel and all that it had stirred up kept nagging at her._ _

__“How was brunch?” He knew she’d been nervous about it since agreeing to it._ _

__She just sighed and rested her cheek on his shoulder, “I don’t really want to talk about it.” She wasn’t sure he would want to hear the details or what she’d been thinking about since returning._ _

__The fingers that he’d been trailing up and down her bare arm froze. “It makes me nervous when you don’t want to talk about something.” He admitted._ _

__“Why?” She asked him incredulously. “You never want to talk about things.” He’d spent so much time and effort in their early days of training trying to convince her to talk less and let him enjoy some peace and quiet in the shop._ _

__“Yeah, but that’s my default. Your default is to overshare all over the place.”_ _

__She rolled her eyes at the description but didn’t push back. It wasn’t untrue. “It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great.” She finally told him. “It just was.” She paused, trying to figure out just what she wanted to tell him about her conversation with Rachel. “She said she’s happy, and she loves her life. Loves New York. She says we’re fine.”_ _

__“That’s good, right?” But he knew there was more._ _

__“Yeah, of course.” She agreed. “But we hurt her.”_ _

__“She told you that? She wasn’t even in the same time zone when we got together.” He had liked Rachel, enjoyed spending time with her, but he knew now they were never going to be long-term. He’d always assumed if she’d felt any different she wouldn’t have left so easily for New York._ _

__“I don’t think it hurt her that we’re together now, but more she was hurt by stuff that happened before she left.”_ _

__Tim frowned in confusion, “nothing happened before she left.”_ _

__“Not physically. Not intentionally. But emotionally?” She took a deep breath. “She didn’t come right out and say that it bothered her how we handled the aftermath of the kidnapping, but she made it very clear that it hurt her how much I relied on you and how much you did for me.”_ _

__“You needed me.” He had never thought twice about answering her calls or helping her in whatever small way he could, whether she’d needed to call him and have him talk to her about whatever random thing he could think of until she fell asleep or come over to watch infomercials at 2 AM. He understood trauma and how it could wreck a person._ _

__“I know.” She pressed her lips to the side of his neck. “I did the crappy thing where I apologized for the fact that she was hurt, but not for doing the stuff that actually hurt her. There was a moment where I almost did apologize to her for all of it, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t apologize to her for doing what I needed to do to survive.”_ _

__“It’s not crappy, Luce. You didn’t do anything wrong.”_ _

__She stood up from his lap and walked over to the edge of the patio where it met the grass to stretch her legs. She looked out over the yard. Cujo was flipping a tennis ball up in the air and happily chasing after it, content to entertain himself._ _

__She turned away from the dog and walked back to Tim, reaching for his hand. He let her tug him to his feet and followed her back into the house, Cujo right behind them. She let go of his hand when she reached the kitchen. She reached for a glass and poured herself some water. She took a long drink and then took a shuddering breath. “Did I ever tell you what I thought about in the barrel?”_ _

__“Lucy.” His voice sounded helpless even to his ears. He hadn’t anticipated the question._ _

__“For the most part, I tried to remember that people were looking for me. Good people. Smart, well-trained people.” She assured him. “But I also thought about all the things I hadn’t done yet and the stuff I was going to miss.” She held up a hand when she sensed he was getting ready to interrupt her. “I thought about the big stuff like how I wanted a real home, and how I wished I’d had a dog, and about how I wanted to fall in love. Get married, have a baby or three.”_ _

__She looked down at the tile under her feet for a moment before continuing. “I thought about the small stuff too. About how much I loved bad karaoke and bingeing even worse reality TV with Jackson. How John is basically an overeager Labrador, a little dopey and impossibly sweet in the best way. How much I love my mom’s chicken and dumpling soup, and how I’ve never been able to make it quite the way that she does. I thought about how much pride I felt when I could make you smile. The tiny one that you try to hide because you’re equal parts annoyed and charmed by me.” She smiled at him now, “And the real one that reaches your eyes. Both were hard-earned back then.” Both versions never failed to slam into her with how wonderful they were._ _

__He took her hand and led her into the living room. “Lunch with Rachel made you think about all of this?” He wondered if pushing her to go had been a mistake._ _

__She sat on the couch and he perched on the end of the coffee table. He kept her hand tightly in his, and she was glad for it. She reached her other hand out to him too. “Lunch with Rachel made me realize how much more my survival was than just getting out of the barrel. It was seeing you and Cujo on the couch that made me remember the rest.”_ _

__“I...Lucy, I…” He was horrified. He never wanted to be a trigger to that time for her._ _

__She could see all the emotions playing over his face and in his eyes. “Listen.” She squeezed his hand tightly to bring him back into the moment. “I walked into this house this afternoon, and I saw you, and I realized all of those things that I thought I was going to lose or never have. I have them. I have a dog, I fell in love, I have a real home. It’s all so much better than I ever thought it could be, and that’s why I need you to really hear what I’m about to tell you.”_ _

__Whatever it was important to her, “okay.” He promised her immediately._ _

__“I do believe you when you tell me that I saved myself.” She started, and it was true. He and her therapist both had told her enough times that she accepted it as her truth._ _

__“Good, because you did. You dropped your ring, that’s how I found you.” He would tell her that as many times as she needed to hear it._ _

__“Now, I need you to believe me when I tell you that you saved me too. We did it together. When I dropped my ring, I knew that you would be the only one to find it and know it was mine. I left it for you. Only for you.” She had known from the moment she regained consciousness that Tim would never stop until he found her. “I used your training, I believed in you, and I fought to hold on. I’m not going to let you deflect that or refuse to believe it anymore.”_ _

__He couldn’t say anything. She was fighting for him, he realized. Fighting to give him something he’d never let himself admit to needing. Someone who would fight for him, not just with him. Someone who truly saw him and understood the deepest most hidden parts of himself. Someone who wanted to take care of him, who believed in him. Someone who was going to stay._ _

__“Are you okay?” She whispered. Watching him process his thoughts and emotions had always been fascinating to her. He tried so hard to keep a tough exterior, to not let anything show. She had heard all the talk about how he was an unfeeling hardass, had even bought into it at times in the beginning. It hadn’t taken her too long to understand that he actually felt everything, felt it all too deeply, and had no idea what to do with it most of the time._ _

__“I kind of feel like you’re tearing my heart apart and putting it back together all at the same time.”_ _

__“Yeah, I know what that feels like.” She squeezed his hands before letting go so she could stand up from the couch. “I’m going to go have a cathartic cry in a hot shower and then collapse into bed for a nap.” She felt emotionally and physically wrung out. Like her heart had been torn apart and put back together all at the same time. “I’m okay, Tim, it’s just what I need.” She answered the unvoiced concern she could feel radiating off him._ _

__She wasn’t surprised when she finally emerged from the bathroom, damp hair in a messy bun, and wearing one of his faded Dodgers t-shirts to find him in bed relaxing against the headboard, phone in hand. She noticed air pods on his nightstand and knew he was passing up watching some game on the big screen to use his phone instead. All so he could be next to her while she slept._ _

__She climbed over him and maneuvered her body under the covers. She could feel sleep start to pull at her as soon as her head hit the pillow. “I love you.”_ _

__“I love you too. Always.”_ _


End file.
